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‘Father of the iPod’ talks engineering

Apple’s senior vice president of its iPod division, Tony Fadell, made a rare public appearance this week, opening an engineering and technology centre at a US school.

While there, he made a few statements intended to motivate students to get into engineering, and revealing a few morsels and tidbits for anyone involved in digital music who watches the iPod a little.

Fadell stressed that engineers are in demand across the US, revealing that half of his team at Apple had to be brought in from other countries. Fadell also gave iPods to the school administrators and the top 20 school students.

The man credited with inventing the whole notion of a music player linked to a music store stressed the need to inspire tomorrow’s engineers, saying that the devices should be part of the inspiration.

“With much of their time dedicated to these technological marvels, we should ask ourselves, ‘How many of our young adults know how these products work?’?” Fadell said. “How are they designed? Manufactured?”